‘All but 1,880 Aasare houses completed’

Over 51,000 houses have been completed and another 1,880 are pending under the “Aasare” flood relief and rehabilitation programme in north Karnataka, according to Chief Minister Jagadish Shettar.

Aasare is the first public-private rehabilitation effort that was taken up on an unprecedented scale in the aftermath of the October 2009 floods in 15 districts, Mr. Shettar said after releasing a compendium on flood relief efforts on Thursday. The State’s relief figures surpass similar efforts that flood-affected Tamil Nadu and Gujarat took up at the same time, he said in the presence of Housing Minister V. Somanna.

In all, 289 villages were relocated — 149 fully — with schools, health centres and other amenities. Of the 57,350 houses planned to be built, 51,118 were completed and 43,159 houses handed over to the affected families. The government would speed up the construction of the remaining 1,880 houses that were not taken up due to land acquisition hurdles in four villages.

Some 230 people died in the unprecedented floods that swept the districts of Belgaum, Bijapur, Dharwad, Gadag, Haveri, Karwar, Gulbarga, Yadgir, Bidar, Raichur, Bellary, Koppal, Bagalkot and Davangere.

The rehabilitation programme needs 5,792 acres of land — of them, over 4,000 acres would be private-owned. As many as 285 layouts were completed. The State released Rs. 155 crore to acquire some of the land, said M. Lakshminarayana, Principal Secretary, Housing, and Principal Secretary II to the Chief Minister. The government raised about Rs. 428 crore from public, private and corporate donations and received around Rs. 1,600 crore as relief from the Centre.